by Wood, Lynn
When he could no longer hold back his own driving need, Luke switched their positions, so this time it was he who rose above her, he who took, he who reveled in the softness of her flesh, the way her eyes went unseeing beneath him, the way her voice pleaded in soft whispers for him to drive into her and claim what was his, and only his, this one night and forever more. She clung to him, meeting thrust for thrust until she simply surrendered to his greater strength, his deeper longing. He felt her melt beneath him, as if her bones had been transformed into liquid inside of her. She surrounded him, poured herself over him, seeped into him, until he lost all sense of separation from her. She was no longer just his; she was in him, a part of him, until he doubted he could continue to exist without her.
When he could wait no longer, when his need to possess finally overrode his desire to make this one union last forever, he drove into her and released the bonds of his control. Again and again he plunged, deeper, harder, faster, more always more until on an exultant shout of satisfaction he emptied himself into his bride, his wife, his mate. From somewhere beyond his own fulfillment he thought he heard the echo of a feminine cry of release even as he slowly returned to a sense of himself, of the tent surrounding them, the rich pallet they rested on.
At her nudge, he propped himself up on his elbows, unwilling to separate from her completely where their two bodies remained joined, and stared down into her flushed face. Her bluer than blue eyes were glazed with a mixture of satisfied passion and the promise of a lifetime of such unions. His lips curved in anticipation of the life awaiting him in her arms. If everything she’d put him through to gain this moment with her, to reap the promise of their life together was the price of the love he saw shining in her eyes, he paid it willingly and counted himself the luckiest of men.
Seeing him smiling down at her with a sated look in his dark eyes, Melissa remarked, “I have another favor to ask of you.”
Grinning, Luke replied, “Considering how the last one turned out, I’m all ears.”
Melissa laughed at his teasing, but warned, “You may have stronger feelings about this favor.”
Seeing her serious expression, he cocked an eyebrow and prompted her. “Well, bride, I can assure you you’re unlikely to ever find me in a better mood than I am right now.”
Melissa grinned. “I am counting on that.”
Curious, Luke urged her. “Well?”
Melissa drew a deep breath and began, “If we have a son…”
“Yes? If we have a son?” Luke prompted at her hesitation.
Melissa hesitated, then her request of him came out in a rush. “I want to name him Michel.”
Despite his good mood, Luke was willing to let his wife suffer a moment or two of anxiety, but after seeing her apprehension displayed so vividly in her expressive eyes, he smiled and admitted, “I assumed you would want to name our son Michel.”
“What? You did?” Melissa countered astonished, then added quickly. “That’s not an answer, husband. Do you agree to my entreaty or not?”
Luke grinned, thinking this might be the only time in their entire acquaintance he held a bargaining chip with his wife. He really shouldn’t throw it away so quickly. “Yes, I agree to your request.”
“You do?” Her blue eyes grew wide with excitement and she jumped up from her prone position and pushed him on his back and then straddled him. Bending down she placed grateful kisses across his chest. “Thank you, thank you, thank you.”
Laughing at her enthusiastic reaction, he caught her face between his hands, then drew her down towards him. Their lips met and hers softened before opening beneath his insistent demand.
“And if she’s not a he?” Luke inquired smiling.
Her eyes sparkled down at him and she flung her hair over her shoulder, revealing her naked breasts to his avid gaze. She leaned up over him so her breasts dangled directly over his mouth. Luke’s breath left his lips in a longing gasp. Melissa leaned down and sliding against him, flesh to flesh, she brushed her lips against his ear when she confessed, “If she’s not a he, I want to name her Michel.”
Luke laughed, assuming she was teasing him, then seeing she was serious, laughed harder and in a single movement once more reversed their positions, pinning her to the ground. Her incredible eyes laughed up in response to his manhandling of her. “Well, husband? What is your answer?”
“Maybe you should convince me,” Luke suggested, astonished to feel the sharp twinge of reawakened lust rising again within him.
In the predawn light, his bride led him through the opening of their bridal tent along a well-traveled path towards where the rush of the falls disturbed the silence of the waning night. Like children escaping from an unwanted companion or chore, they slipped through the brush hiding the entrance to the trail that crossed behind the cascading water. Entranced by the view and the sound of water falling all around him, Luke resisted his wife’s pull and drew her back to him.
“Where are you taking me, nymph?” He asked, because that was how she appeared to him in the dappled sunlight piercing the water, gliding surely along the wet, uneven surface they traversed. In response to his query, she merely shrugged, and smiling continued to pull him along the path.
He was in a mood to allow her to lead, and he was content to enjoy the view of her bare legs peeking out beneath the blue silk robe she hastily slipped on for modesty’s sake as they left the tent. The belt was tied only loosely around her slim waist affording him a tantalizing view of the soft fullness of her breasts whenever she turned back along the narrow way to make certain he hadn’t lost his footing. They emerged moments later at the edge of a small, natural pool. Steam rose up from the surface, attesting to its warmth in the chill air of early spring.
Delighted, he turned his attention back to his wife, only to have his breath catch in his throat as her hand yanked on the loose tie belted around her waist. He watched with his breath caught in his throat as she shrugged out of her robe and let it fall to the damp, rocky surface at her feet. Smiling knowingly at his dazed expression, she stepped into the warmth of the water. Luke was too busy thanking the Almighty for his good fortune to immediately follow his wife. He watched as her glorious hair spread out around her, then trailed beneath her under the surface. The water was so clear he could watch her naked form glide beneath the surface to the far side of the pool where she came up for air. With a flirtatious gesture she beckoned him to join her.
Luke needed to no further urging, and with less grace than speed, he stepped out of his own cloths and into the water. It was deeper than he assumed and he realized he couldn’t touch the bottom in the center. For a moment he wondered how deep the pool was, but was quickly distracted by the sight of his wife lifting a bare arm to push the heavy weight of her hair behind her. Like a moth to a flame, his avid gaze followed the curve of her arm, the welcoming light in her eyes, until he was close enough to reach for her. His hands roamed boldly over her slick skin, and then gripped her waist and lifted her towards him until their lips brushed against each other’s.
Laughing softly Melissa circled Luke’s waist with her legs and wrapped her arms around his neck. “It’s so beautiful here. When I was a little girl I used to come here to swim in the morning before anyone else was awake. The water’s so warm. I really hate the cold. I am not certain why, but it seems to bother me more than other people. It is a weakness I have never been able to overcome.”
Luke was struck by his wife’s interpretation of her dislike for the cold and would no doubt have chided her for it, if she wasn’t looking at him the way she was now, so open, so free of the weight of grief she carried for so long. So instead he teased, coaxing a lighthearted laugh from her lips. “If you are ever cold, it is my sacred duty as your husband to make you warm.”
“Your sacred duty, husband?” She laughed as his lips trailed along the column of her throat, then he used his strength to lift her above him so his mouth could close over her breast. The laughter died in her throat when h
is tongue circled her straining nipple and she clutched his shoulders as her strength deserted her.
“Actually,” Luke whispered into her other ear, after his mouth blazed a trail across her flesh and up the other side of her neck. “I prefer you hot, wife, not warm, but hot, clinging, needy, and desperate for me to be inside you.”
Melissa could barely retain a thread of their conversation. Her thoughts kept breaking apart inside her head. Every time she tried to gather them for some flirtatious response, Luke’s busy mouth and hands stole her breath away.
“Give me the words, Melissa,” he demanded as he shifted her weight so his thrusting manhood was poised at her slick opening.
“What?”
Luke smiled at his wife’s disorientation. Her head was thrown back, revealing the long column of her throat to his appreciative gaze. Her hands were gripping his shoulders so tight, her nails dug into his flesh. He was certain he would bear her marks when they emerged from their blissful, solitary retreat. “The words, wife. Tell me you want me, tell me you need me inside of you.”
An answering sob, then she lifted her head so she could stare into his eyes as she gave him what he demanded of her. “Yes, God yes, I want you, I need you. Please, Luke, I can’t stand being alone any longer.”
He drove into her and she clenched around him. The nearby rush of the falls drowned out the sounds of their joining, the breathless gasps, the driving moans, the beckoning pleas for more, until his wife’s core tightened around his thrusting member and she screamed her release, as she seemed to come apart in his arms. Luke held onto his own control long enough to prolong his wife’s pleasure, then emptied himself on a long groan of satisfaction into her still seething heat.
Spent, he leaned them both up against the stone and earth side of the pool. “God, God, how did I ever live without that?” His wife’s awed whisper reached him where he rested his face against her wet flesh.
Luke’s shoulders shook with amused appreciation, and he summoned the strength to lift his head and gaze down into his wife’s flatteringly stunned face. “We’re just getting started,” he promised, bringing an intrigued and speculative look to his wife’s expression.
“Really?”
He laughed at the eager curiosity revealed in her probing glance, then regretfully took note of the sun climbing in the sky and guessed their sanctuary would not remain private long enough for him to answer the questions he could see swirling within the depths of his wife’s eyes. “Don’t tempt me.”
Melissa grinned, and teased in a husky whisper, a sultry look in her eyes. “I thought you liked it when I tempted you.”
Luke was only a man after all, and one he rationalized who had surely worked harder than any other groom before him ever labored for a chance to claim his bride, therefore he was not about to pass on the blatant invitation his wife just issued him.
So it was some hours later the bride and groom emerged a second time from their bridal tent, but this time they strode hand in hand down the path leading them back to the more public areas of the camp where they both hoped a second wedding feast awaited them.
“I swear I’m starving. Hopefully they will have left some food for us,” Melisa remarked, as she brushed a gentle hand across her stomach.
Luke was struck by the gesture and came to an abrupt halt in the middle of the path. Melissa turned to regard him curiously. “Luke, is everything all right?”
Luke’s eyes stared down into hers, and then his hands slid possessively over her very slightly rounded stomach where his babe rested. “You’re pregnant.”
Melissa smiled at the seeming astonishment in his voice. “Yes, remember? We’re going to name our baby Michel.”
Luke nodded, and then shook his head. “Last night, this morning, I should have been more careful, more considerate…” His voice trailed off at the sound of his wife’s laugher.
“If you’d been any more considerate, I am quite certain you would be forced to carry me to breakfast.”
“Melissa, I’m sorry. I should have realized, I should have…”
Melissa only laughed harder at his attempt to apologize for his rough treatment of her. Oh God, this morning, he’d… But his stricken look only set his wife off on further gales of laughter.
“Oh, Luke, if you could see your face,” Melissa managed to get out, then seeing he didn’t share in her amusement, and aware of his very real concern, she got herself under control, and stepped forward to clasp her husband’s bewildered face between both of her hands. She kissed him softly on the lips, and assured him, “Our babe, is fine.” Then at the confirmation of her promise from the child within her belly, she reached for one of her husband’s hands and introduced him to his son or daughter.
She decided the look of astonished awe on his face was an appropriate response to such an introduction.
Chapter Twenty Six
When they arrived at the clearing, Melissa let out an audible sigh of relief at the scent of the fresh meat sizzling over the open fires. Luke grinned when she gripped his hand and began pulling him along.
“Do you want our baby to starve?”
But when they reached the clearing where the tables were set up Melissa lost all interest in food, because standing there next to her grandmother, obviously waiting for her to make an appearance, was Michel. She let out a cry of joy as their identical eyes met, and then lifted her skirts and ran straight into her twin’s outstretched arms. They closed around her as she jumped into his embrace and wrapped her legs around his waist. He swung them both around as Melissa alternately laughed and cried against his neck, and clung to him so tightly she thought she might never let him go.
Brother and sister spent the morning alone, catching up, filling in gaps and simply enjoying being with the other half of themselves. When conversation slowed, neither rushed to fill the gap. They were content to draw strength from the other’s presence, to soak it in, knowing it wouldn’t last long.
“I wish you had arrived last night. We would have waited for you,” Melissa was saying as arm in arm they strolled back in the direction of the others.
“No, I deliberately waited. A man has a right on his wedding day to be the sole focus of his bride’s attention.”
Melissa sighed her understanding. “I suppose you’re right. Nothing’s the same is it?”
Michel did not pretend not to understand what she was saying. “No, nothing will ever be the same. You’re leaving for Normandy, and I…”
At his hesitation, she filled in the words for him, “And you’re leaving too.”
“Yes.”
“It seems as though we only just found each other again.”
Michel smiled tenderly, and reached up a gentle hand to brush the tears from her eyes. “I know, but it was inevitable this day would come, even if the war had not.”
Melissa nodded, using her own hand this time to impatiently brush away her tears. “Luke said I was a grown woman now and it was time I began acting like one.”
Michel laughed and offered, “Shall I kill him for his blasphemy?”
His outrageous offer drew a smile to her lips. “I guess in some ways, he was right. I have to let go of the past and I have to let go of you so you can do what we both know you must without worrying about me.”
Her twin’s blue eyes so like her own, stared down into her upturned face. “Should I worry about you?” When Melissa shook her head, Michel pushed, “Because you know you will always come first. If you need me…”
Melissa stopped him with a hand on his lips. “Now who is speaking blasphemy? I will always need you, Michel, but you don’t have to worry about me. Luke’s right. My place is with him now, as his wife, and as the mother of our children.”
A speculative light filled Michel’s eyes and he glanced meaningfully in the direction of her still flat stomach. “Children?”
Melissa laughed. “No, no. I meant in time. I don’t even know how to be the mother of one babe let alone two.”
Michel grinned, and slung his arm around her shoulder, turning her back in the direction of the clearing where the others waited. “You’ll learn.”
“Rhiann will be better at it than me.”
Michel laughed. “The two of them will no doubt produce perfect little lords and ladies.”
“She’s trying so hard to be a dutiful wife to Nathan.”
“She’s giving him fits,” Michel corrected with a bemused shake of his head. “And he’s so desperately in love with her he doesn’t know how to turn her into the perfect wife she’s trying so hard to be for him.”
“Well at least Luke is under no illusions I will prove a dutiful wife.”
Grinning, Michel replied, “And he is so insanely in love with you I cannot even be angry with him for stealing your heart away from me.”
Melissa shook her head in denial and met his amused glance with a serious expression. “My heart still belongs to you. Does it not beat in a singular rhythm with yours? Luke and I are more often at odds than not.”
“But you love him.”
“Yes.” When he failed to respond to her admission, she added, “I can see you do not understand how I can claim my heart is still yours and yet love Luke as I do.”
“No, it’s true. What our mother did I cannot comprehend. Would you ever be tempted to make the same choice?”
Understanding his worry, Melissa sighed, reflecting on her mother’s decision to seek death at the hands of a Norman sword, rather than be forced to accept a Norman knight in her bed. “I do not know.” Seeing her twin’s shock at her admission, she realized a man was incapable of understanding why a woman would prefer death over the alternative of retaining her noble status for what a man no doubt considered a small price of submitting to the dictates of a new lord and husband. “I’m not certain I could have done what Rhiann did, wed an enemy knight, a man who was a stranger to me and welcome him into my bed. Clearly mother refused to contemplate such a course for herself.” Melissa blinked back tears at the reminder of their shared grief. “I miss her, especially now. I miss them all. Promise me I won’t be missing you in the same way a year from now.”